It has come to my attention through reporting by Otis R. Taylor, Jr. of the San Francisco Chronicle on November 2, 2017, that there has been a series of complaints by several female ICE detainees in the Contra Costa County West County Jail located in Richmond, California.

These complaints include horrendous conditions of detention that the ICE detainees are suffering in the County jail under contract with ICE. The report describes jail cells with no toilets, the humiliation of female inmates forced to relieve themselves by urinating and defecating in their clothes or plastic bags, being locked-up for 23 hours a day, frequent cancellation of the one-hour time outside the cells, intolerable food, lack of basic health care services, and a terrifying environment with distressed inmates screaming and pounding on their cell doors.

As a U.S. citizen, a resident of Richmond, a tax-payer and a former Mayor of Richmond, I demand that you immediately stop these intolerable conditions of detention and cease all and every abuse of basic human rights of the people detained in any facility under your jurisdiction.

I demand that you send me written confirmation that you will stop such activities. You risk severe legal consequences if you permit these abuses within your facility to continue.

You are hereby warned and advised that you will be held responsible legally and politically for the actions denounced by the inmates. The actions constitute not only violations of basic human and constitutional rights, but are also attacks to the integrity and reputation of the Richmond community with our city being the location of the facility in which these cruelties are conducted.

Citizens and elected officials of Richmond, myself included, have demanded repeatedly that you cease and desist participating in ICE abuses and that you terminate your contract with ICE. You have ignored these requests and by doing so, have violated the dignity and principles of our City and County.